


Conflicts with Interest

by katiemariie



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Banter, Interspecies Relationship(s), M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-21
Updated: 2017-12-21
Packaged: 2019-02-18 03:26:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,363
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13091442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katiemariie/pseuds/katiemariie
Summary: "Having recently picked up a few interrogation tactics from a man he somehow calls a friend, Odo’s been waiting for a private moment to field test a new method of persuasion. And there’s no better time than after closing." Or, Odo tortures Quark with sentiment.





	Conflicts with Interest

**Author's Note:**

> Written as part of Star Trek Secret Santa 2017 for Cynthia who wanted, "Quark/Odo and a quiet moment at the bar, probably after closing!! Definitely want some Quodo vibes if possible, but Gen is fine too!"
> 
> Many thanks to AreYouReady for the beta.

After a day delightfully devoid of meetings, briefings, and other mandatory distractions, Odo punches in the code to his desk drawer, locking his newly conquered backlog of reports inside. He stands, raising his arms over his head in a stretch. He feels, and almost hears, something inside slosh back into place. He’s as healthy as Dr. Bashir has ever seen a Changeling, but sitting for hours on end will get anyone out of joint—even if they don’t have joints.

Odo used to despise forms, Starfleet logs, reports that kept him out of the field. But after so many brushes with his own mortality, he can see the value in taking the time to leave a record, something that officially captures his work so that it might outlive him.

Leave opera to the Klingons; forms and files suit Odo just fine.

That said, nothing compares to a little fieldwork: interviewing suspects, keeping tabs on informants, maintaining a presence on the Promenade. Something, despite appreciating the importance of his other duties, he’s missed today.

With the bulk of the station asleep and regeneration creeping up on him, Odo’s community policing options at this hour are limited. But he can think of one station resident still going about his business who’d benefit from some extrajudicial needling.

Having recently picked up a few interrogation tactics from a man he somehow calls a friend, Odo’s been waiting for a private moment to field test a new method of persuasion. And there’s no better time than after closing.

After securing his office and double-checking the locks, Odo takes to the Promenade, allowing his legs to lengthen and retract to whatever size they wish with every step. With no one to see him, what’s the harm in a little superfluous shapeshifting?

Coming upon the doors already locked, Odo slithers through the alloyed metal frame, reemerging unrumpled on the other side. Utterly unobserved, Odo may or may not take a moment to ensure that his hair—always an ungainly thing—is perfectly in place. Satisfied, he makes his way toward the bar.

Quark does not look up from his PADD. “You know you can’t sneak up on me this late. I can hear you gurgling around in there.” He gestures vaguely and unseeingly at Odo’s abdomen. “You should go home before you melt in on yourself like a Delavian truffle.”

“Why, Quark,” Odo says, affecting a softer, melodic tone, “I didn’t know you cared.”

Quark snickers. “The only thing I care about right now is this quarter’s custodial costs. I don’t want to add mopping you up to my deficit.”

Odo approaches the bar in a lazy gait. “You know, I’ve always admired your way with numbers, budget projections, that sort of thing.”

Quark snorts. “Really?”

“Yes.” Odo slips onto a barstool across from Quark. “I’ve never had much interest or skill when it comes to numbers—especially the negative figures you deal in—but I appreciate people who put so much stock in something as fair and objective as mathematics.”

Quark puts down his PADD and looks up with a smile like artificial glucose substitute. “That’s funny. Because I seem to remember you coming in here not so long ago ranting about how my accounting practices ‘perverted the sanctity of quantitative reasoning.’ End quote.”

Odo shrugs. “Perversion takes skill.” Laying it on thick, he adds, “As I’m sure you know.”

Taking offense, Quark sneers. “It takes one to know one.”

Odo leans across the bar, elongating his neck just a little. (Cardassian beauty standards are pernicious.) “Is that an offer?”

“What?”

“Was that an offer to _know_ you?”

“Ohhh.” Quark stands up straight, crossing his arms over his chest. “So that’s why you’re in here so late.”

Odo blinks twice, his first public attempt at batting his eyes. “Am I that obvious?”

“ _You_ wanted to practice your Garak routine.”

“My what?” Odo sputters. 

For someone with neither the temperament or training for investigative work, Quark still manages to pinpoint Odo’s motives with unnerving accuracy.

“Don’t play coy with me,” Quark chides. “You come in here late at night—literally stepping out from the shadows, I might add—while I’m all alone and vulnerable, and you start with the flattery, and the flirting, and the… weird blinking. You’re trying to get to me.”

“Quark,” Odo lets his voice drop to its usual register, “if I wanted to get to you, I would reach across the bar.”

Quark tilts his head, considering this. “Pretty good. A little direct for this stage, but still, a good mix of threat and seduction.”

Odo grimaces. “I’m pleased to meet your high standards.”

Quark winces, waving a hand at Odo’s face. “I wouldn’t try that again.”

“Try what?”

“This.” Quark contorts his face into a grimace. “Not very seductive.”

“Well, good,” Odo harrumphs. “Because I’m not trying to be seductive or threatening or Garak.” At least not now.

“That’s a relief.” Quark shakes his head ruefully. “Watching someone fail so spectacularly when they’re actually trying? When I’m not betting against them? It turns my stomach.”

“Your empathy moves me,” Odo says dryly. 

Quark carries on as if he hadn’t heard. “And even if you were good at playing Garak, it wouldn’t get you what you want.”

“And what do I want?”

“Information, access, total control of your surroundings. You’re not gonna get any of that by going on the defensive.”

“Is that what you think Garak does? Defense?” The “need I remind you: he tortured me” remains unsaid; Odo is not fool enough to speak such a secret while in range of his own listening devices.

“As far as I can tell, with a few minor exceptions,” Quark says slowly, pacifingly, “Garak’s life here is all about maintaining what little he has. But you? You want more. And acquisition requires a bit more aggression than stasis. You’re not going to get anything more out of life by acting mysterious and alluring. You’ve been doing that for years and as far as I can tell it’s gotten you nowhere. Putting Garak’s spin on it isn’t going—”

Odo furrows his brow with some difficulty. “Did you just call me ‘alluring?’”

“No,” Quark sputters. “No. I said you were acting alluring. I didn’t say you were any good at it. Personally, I find you repulsive. Always have.”

“And yet you keep coming back for more.”

“Me? Coming back?” Quark says. “I’m not the one who runs over here whenever I’m a little bit bored.”

“Please—”

“Or lonely.”

“—I keep tabs on you for—”

“It’s like your people put another homing instinct in your cells—”

“—professional reasons only.”

“—telling you to flock to Quark whenever you have any negative emotion.”

Hopeless to out-talk him, Odo gives up on his protests and meets Quark where he’s at. “Or maybe,” Odo says, “I just associate you with negative emotions.” He cocks his head to the side. “Now I wonder how that could have happened.”

“It sure beats me!” Quark throws up his arms. “All I’ve ever done since the day we’ve met is try to make you happy. You and everyone else on this station! All I do is nurture and provide and—”

Finding neither Garak’s flirtatious obfuscation nor his own brand of surliness particularly effective so far, Odo interrupts with a new tack still in testing. “And you’ve done a wonderful job,” Odo says, adding a bit of teasing fondness to his voice.

“—think of new ways to make your lives a little more comfortable, a little more enjoyable, a little better.”

Odo rests his elbows on the bar. “And you have.”

“So finally he admits it,” Quark says in the direction of the bar’s safe—his version of the heavens.

Odo tucks his fists under his chin. “You are a constant source of company, encouragement, and counsel. Whatever is happening in my life or on the station, I know I can poke my head into the bar and there you’ll be in your tailored suits, decorative powder around your eyes, those shoes that make your calves…” Odo trails off with a shy grin.

“What?” Quark sits down, scooting his barstool as close as he can. “The shoes that make my calves do what?”

Odo looks up through his stubby, malformed lashes. “If I had a heart, it would skip a beat. If I had lungs, I would lose a breath. If I had kidneys, they would poison me.”

Quark sighs, visibly deflating. “Oh no, not this again.”

“If I had ears, they would pop. If I had skin, it would burn. If I had bones, they would break.”

“I get it.” Quark rests the lumps of his forehead on the bar. “If you had body parts, they’d stop working. I get it.”

“I don’t think you do.” Odo leans down, speaking directly to the back of Quark’s head, “You make me feel things I never thought possible. What we have is beyond anything I could have ever imagined. After leaving Dr. Mora’s lab, I was determined to live my life on my own terms, and that meant alone. I was convinced that companionship would mean compromising myself, changing who I am, and I never wanted to do that again. But you’ve never asked me to change. Not in any real way.”

“I’ve asked you to change,” Quark says, his voice muffled by the bar. “I’m asking you right now. I’m begging you.”

Odo ignores that, trudging forward. “We have something remarkable, something no two other people on this station share.”

“Mutual disdain?” Quark cuts in.

“We are true companions. For all our differences, we truly complement each other. I reel you in, and you draw me out. We may fight and bicker and cause minor disturbances on the Promenade, but at the end of the day, we always come to an understanding. That’s what makes our bond so unbreakably strong.”

“I hate you,” Quark moans.

Odo rests his chin on the back of Quark’s head, gently smushing his wrinkly nose into the bar.

“I adore you,” Odo whispers reverently. “You are so much of who I’ve become. You are my home in a world of strangers. You are my first friend, my best friend.” Odo pauses for a moment before softly starting, “ _You are my sunshine, my only sunshine. You make me happy when skies are grey. You’ll never know dear, how much I lo—_ ”

“Stop! Please stop!” Quark screeches, his head wriggling under Odo’s chin. “I’ll tell you anything! Please!”

“Anything?” Odo asks, returning to his gravelly tone.

“Anything. I’ll tell you anything. Just so long as you stop singing.”

“That sounds fair.” 

Odo sits up straight, removing the pressure from the back of Quark’s head. Seizing Quark by the ears, he uses just enough force to get Quark’s face off the table and his eyes locked on Odo, but not enough to actually hurt him. (Purely to avoid a lawsuit, of course.)

He glowers at Quark. “In the past quarter, have you entered into any new business arrangements or modified any of your existing business arrangements?”

Quark nods, a gesture severely hampered by Odo’s hold on him.

“Do these new or modified arrangements involve entities with any ties to the Bajoran government (particularly the militia), Starfleet, or any intragalactic powers that may have an interest in the station?”

Quark holds his hand parallel to the bartop, shaking it slightly.

“Do said entities sell or manufacture security and/or detection devices? Or any other deliverables whose procurement falls under the duties and discretion of the station’s chief security officer?”

Quark shakes his head.

“Are you engaged in any other business or political activities that may compromise my objectivity in professional matters or bring about accusations of corruption?”

Again, Quark shakes his head.

“Are you telling the truth?”

Quark nods as fervently as he can.

“Good,” Odo says.

In a move learned from a Trill rather than a Cardassian, Odo tilts Quark’s head up and kisses him firmly on the lips. In danger of succumbing to sentiment, Odo pulls away quickly and takes a good step back from the bar. From this vantage point, he can watch as Quark nearly collapses from the strain of it all—emotional and otherwise.

“Well.” Odo holds his hands behind his back. “That was informative.”

Quark leans over the bar, practically crawling across. “Are you sure there isn’t anything else you need to know?”

“No, my work today is done. I think it’s time we go home for the night.”

“You know, you might be right, but…” Quark stares longingly at the Ferengi figures glowing from his PADD. “The boss doesn’t really get a night off.”

“I have an hour until I need to regenerate,” Odo says. “Do you really want to spend that time running your quarterly numbers?”

“This isn’t a matter of want, but need. As a business owner, I place huge demands on myself. I mean, when you think about it, I exploit myself just as much as my employees.”

“As a business owner, you can choose: come to bed with me now or spend the night exploiting yourself.”

Quark wavers, glancing from Odo to his PADD and back again. “Can’t I do both?”

“Fine,” Odo grumbles. “But if you even think of looking at that PADD before I go to sleep, I will grab my bucket and regenerate in the bathroom.”

And with more fluidity than Odo thought him capable, Quark snatches his PADD, climbs over the bar, and pecks Odo on the cheek. “Perfect.”

Odo sighs and heads for the door. “You’re not even going to try to sleep tonight, are you? Once I’m regenerating, you’re just going to sit there, tapping at that damn screen, sweating over your lost fortunes?”

Quark follows, hooking an arm around Odo’s waist. “Probably.”

Odo waits while Quark opens the lock. “If you die of exhaustion, I’m selling your remains to the lowest bidder.”

Quark smirks. “Better to die from exhaustion than live with an unbalanced ledger.”

Suddenly, Odo finds his disdain for professional recordkeeping returning, but he must admit: “It’s not living with a ledger that’s the problem.” Odo follows Quark out the door and toward home. “It’s living with you.”


End file.
